downworllders:

f-f-f-fight:

The death toll continues to rise amid concerns that disease and food insecurity could claim even more lives, according to the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC). 

IFRC spokesperson Antony Balmain tells TIME that the flooding has heightened the risk of diarrhea, dengue fever, Japanese encephalitis and other diseases. x

update at 8/31/17 6am EST, about 2 hours ago:
Mumbai building collapses as monsoon rains wreak havoc. Storm moving on to Pakistan, lashing port of Karachi

donate to: 
islamic relief usa
oxfam.uk
oxfam.india*
save the children.india*
save the children.org (donations go to an emergency fund)

* for residents of india

please add any updates or other ways to help 

here’s an article from the independent on how you can help!

South Asia floods kill 1,200 and shut 1.8 million children out of school

earlhamclassics:

“The technique has revealed several regions of interest. “Several textual portions of up to fourteen lines were identified for the first time, the largest ever detected so far in unopened papyrus rolls,” say Bukreeva and co.

That’s fascinating work that opens the way to more virtual unrollings. As Bukreeva and co put it: “The optimisation and the automatisation of the virtual unfolding procedure open up new perspectives in this direction, which are likely to produce a future breakthrough in our knowledge and understanding of ancient philosophy and classical literature.”

Folks.

This is huge.

To put it in perspective, the new Sappho poem (58) is “only” twelve lines and it rocked our goddamned worlds.

If they’ve now got the tech to pull fourteen line chunks from these scrolls with any regularity, things are about to go bananas.

B-A-N-A-N-A-S.

First ‘virtual’ unrolling of ancient scroll buried by Vesuvius reveals early text

ravenmorganleigh:

On Monday, April 3, 2017, the President signed into law:

H.J.Res. 69, which nullifies the Department of the Interior’s Fish and Wildlife Service’s final rule relating to non-subsistence takings of wildlife on National Wildlife Refuges in Alaska;

H.J.Res. 83, which nullifies the Department of Labor’s rule titled Clarification of Employer’s Continuing Obligation to Make and Maintain an Accurate Record of Each Recordable Injury and Illness; and

H.R. 1228, which provides for the appointment of members of the Board of Directors of the Office of Compliance to replace members whose terms expire during March and May of 2017; and

S.J.Res. 34 – which nullifies the Federal Communications Commission’s rule on privacy of customers of broadband and other telecommunications services.

This is what happens when we don’t pay attention. 

President Donald J. Trump Signs H.J.Res. 69, H.J.Res. 83, H.R. 1228, S.J.Res. 34 into Law

dr-archeville:

Washington (CNN) – The Trump administration will unveil a new plan Monday to roll back limits on a controversial program that provides local law enforcement agencies with surplus military gear, marking the end of a policy implemented during the Obama administration.

President Barack Obama issued an executive order in 2015 prohibiting the transfer of a host of equipment, including armored vehicles, grenade launchers, high-caliber weapons and camouflage uniforms following controversy over the “militarization” of the police response to unrest in Ferguson, Missouri.

“We’ve seen how militarized gear can sometimes give people a feeling like there’s an occupying force as opposed to a force that’s part of the community that’s protecting them and serving them,” Obama said at the time.  "It can alienate and intimidate local residents and send the wrong message.“

President Donald Trump will sign a new executive order Monday rescinding Obama’s directive and Attorney General Jeff Sessions addressed the policy change during a speech at the annual conference of the Fraternal Order of Police in Nashville, Tennessee, where he received multiple standing ovations and appeared touched by the warm welcome.”

(W)e are fighting a multi-front battle: an increase in violent crime, a rise in vicious gangs, an opioid epidemic, threats from terrorism, combined with a culture in which family and discipline seem to be eroding further and a disturbing disrespect for the rule of law,“ Sessions said, as he walked the audience of mostly law enforcement officials through a broad tour of his policy changes at the Justice Department over the past several months.

“The executive order the President will sign today will ensure that you can get the lifesaving gear that you need to do your job and send a strong message that we will not allow criminal activity, violence and lawlessness to become a new normal,” Sessions added.

Trump’s new executive order was first reported by USA Today.

Civil rights groups swiftly blasted the equipment policy shift Monday, saying the Obama-era guidelines were critical to rebuilding trust with communities of color.

“These guidelines were created after Ferguson to ensure that police departments had a guardian, not warrior, mentality,” said Vanita Gupta, former head of DOJ’s civil rights division under Obama and who now leads the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.  "Our communities are not the same as armed combatants in a war zone.“

But the National Fraternal Order of Police applauded the news and the group’s president, Chuck Canterbury, explained that the FOP has been working to roll back Obama’s restrictions since the day they were announced.

“The previous administration was more concerned about the image of law enforcement being too ‘militarized’ than they were about our safety,” Canterbury said in a statement.  "In an effort to shut down a single program run by the Defense Department, known as the 1033 program, they restricted access to surplus equipment throughout the federal government.“

Congress originally launched the so-called “1033 program” in 1990 as part of the National Defense Authorization Act, which allowed the Defense Department to transfer surplus hardware and equipment to state and local law enforcement for use in “counter-drug activities.”

The recycled gear included equipment the agencies would normally be unable to afford and the original program has resulted in the transfer of more than $5.4 billion worth of gear since the 1990s.

Armored vehicles and other military gear were also used by police officers during the 2015 mass shooting in San Bernardino, California.

A Trump administration document describing the policy shift says that it “sends the message that we care more about public safety than about how a piece of equipment looks, especially when that equipment has been shown to reduce crime, reduce complaints against and assaults on police, and make officers more effective.”

CNN’s Zachary Cohen contributed to this report.

THIS IS NOT NORMAL

Trump to lift military gear ban for local police